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Mathematical Treasure: Popular Spanish Arithmetic

Author(s):

Frank J. Swetz (The Pennsylvania State University)

Juan Gutiérrez de Gualdi was a 16th century Spanish priest and mathematician. His brief arithmetic written for merchants, Arte breve ... de ... arithmetica, published in 1539 in Toledo, was extremely popular and went through five reprintings. It stressed the use of “Hindu-Arabic” numerals instead of Roman numerals. This is the title page for the 1564 edition.